dereference

de- +‎ reference

• (UK) IPA^(key): /dɪˈɹɛfɹəns/

dereference (third-person singular simple present dereferences, present participle dereferencing, simple past and past participle dereferenced)

1. (programming) To access the value or object located in a memory location addressed by a pointer or another value interpreted as such; to access a value being referenced by something else.

   Attempting to dereference a null pointer often results in a crash.

2. (computing, in operating systems derived from Unix) To operate on the file or directory pointed to by a symbolic link, rather than on the link itself.

   Synonyms: follow, resolve

   With the find command, any symbolic links appearing after -follow will be dereferenced.

dereference (plural dereferences)

1. The act by which something is dereferenced.
   • 1999, Michael Barry Greenwald, Non-blocking synchronization and system design, page 77:

     Either each dereference must use a complicated DCAS protocol, or each pointer must include a version number that is managed on each modification and checked on each dereference, or storage management must be tightly coupled […]

• pointer

• dereference on Wikipedia.Wikipedia